Turkish food lovers, like myself, suffer in Dubai, where Turkish cuisine is rarely found. But, as Ottomans restaurant at the Grosvenor House focuses on fusing a multitude of Turkish flavours to create eclectic, mouth watering contemporary dishes, one visit fed all of my, previously deprived, desire.
The restaurant looked tremendously different from my last visit, a couple of years earlier. Now, the terrace is overlooking the marinaâ€™s lake and big towers and the staff is more Turkish than ever. In addition to serving shisha, the terrace also has live singer and Oud performer that will come to your table just to play your requested songs.
If you want to get properly introduced to some of the authentic Turkish refined cuisine, I would strongly recommend the Turkish Mezza for starters composed of Hommos, Eggplant salad, Ezme salad, meat balls in tomato soup, deep fried beef liver and mini puff borek, selectively chosen by the chef H-Deniz Katranci, who has resurrected some long-forgotten Turkish recipes in the menu.
But try not to fill your stomach before the main course as Turkish food is a bit heavy and you could end up with a seriously upset, bloated stomach. If you are not familiar with the names of the food, the perfectly helpful waiters are going to be delighted to help you explain the food ingredients and I would suggest you rely on their suggestions because they know what they are talking about.
Now, once you get to the dessert menu, do not order what you are familiar with, because the most delicious sweets on the face of the planet are the authentic Turkish ones such as creamy Baklava. Once you have those, you will be thanking me for the rest of your life for suggesting them. Just make sure you donâ€™t mispronounce my name.
---Reviewed by Yasmin Helal